Friday Nov 13, 2009

Answer: Yes. So why do the labels want to kill it off? Because they don't. Translation: All this toxic law to cut people off the internet is all about protecting big businesses with tired business models and not about protecting music artists, art or culture. Shame on you, Lord Mandelson.

Saturday Sep 26, 2009

Tina has uploaded these four excellent videos of her performing in the open air in Mainz. She is sounding and looking better than ever, and is the perfect antidote for the pop trend to sloppy slang almost-rap.

Friday Aug 21, 2009

Very interesting overview of the story of Mono and Miguel's role in it. If you've not been following that story all along, it's an especially useful summary and briefing. Note also the GNOME acronym expansion.

O'Grady is circling an important discovery here - that software freedom actually matters as a principle because it leads to growing, free markets of innovation. We may be discovering that dual-licensing is actually a parasitic game played on software freedom caused by placing monetisation before liberty. I sense a discussion forming...

"What this episode really uncovers is that AT&T is dying. AT&T is dragging down the rest of us by overcharging us for voice calls and stifling innovation in a mobile data market critical to the U.S. economy."

I thought the best song in Eurovision was actually the Icelandic one. I discovered that Johanna, the Icelandic performer at Eurovision, has made the most of her appearance and released an album. It's pretty good, even if the is the anti-Bjork. (UK-only link)

Fascinating analysis from CBS of the word frequency in last week's "Duelling Speeches" episode in the US suggests that while Obama's goal is protecting the interests of the American people by closing Guantanamo Bay, Cheney's interest is more in defending his record for history.

"Some of the major US banks have warned the changes may reduce the amount of credit available to some card holders. They say this is because the new rules will make it more difficult for them to set rates based on the risk customers pose." Or, to put it another way, "we should be free to gouge the suckers".

All URIs pointing at BEA blogs and developer resources appear to have been vaped - the old domains don't even point at this page as advertised any more. Not a lot of respect for the integrity of the web round these parts, evidently.